Baildon pair will cycle to southern Spain in tribute to woman they loved

Two Baildon men linked by their love of the same woman are cycling to Spain to raise charity cash in her memory.

Frances Stirk was the sister of Bull’s Head landlord Paul Kearns and the partner of Steve Tindall for 23 years before she died from cancer in May 2012, aged 54.

Before her death the two friends had previously cycled from Land’s End to John o’ Groats to raise money for charity, but now they are commited to a 2,000-mile ride to southern Spain to benefit two good causes.

“Since my sister died it’s always been in our hearts to do something like this in her memory and half of the money we collect will be going to the charity Breakthrough Breast Cancer,” said Mr Kearns, 46, who has run the popular Bull’s Head for two years.

The rest of the money will go to Tomas Leighton Care which benefits an English person who suffers from cerebral palsy and lives in Benalmadena, Spain, where their epic journey will end.

Mechanic Steve Tindall, 55, told how his partner Frances had helped them during their UK ride in 2011.

“Fran travelled all over the country supporting us during that one.

“She had made a very good recovery from breast cancer and a mastecomy, but then the cancer spread to her liver,” Mr Tindall said.

“It was the obvious thing to do something for a breast cancer charity and also Tomas Leighton is the son of family friends,” he explained.

Both men are now starting to train hard on their high performance carbon fibre road bikes.

“We will be doing 100 miles a day on average, so we’ll do some 250 mile weekends in Britain in prepartion,” Mr Tindall said.

Their route will take them through England for about 300 miles on B roads to pick up a ferry across the Channel into France.

Promoted stories

They will then follow a westerly route through France, cycling through Normandy towards, Le Mans, Tours and Limoges.

Then they will pedal on further south through the Dordogne to Toulouse.

After that it is east towards Carcasonne and Narbonne where the route heads south to Perpignan, over the Pyrenees and into Spain.

The route through Spain follows the east coast, passing through Figeures, Lloret De Mar, Barcelona, Benidorm, Alicante, Malaga and finally into Banalmadena.

Share article

Two other pub regulars will be providing back-up support on the journey in a specially-bought mobile home.

Details of the training and ways to help with fundraising will soon be on the website: fromraintospain.org.uk

Ipsoregulated

This website and associated newspapers adhere to the Independent Press Standardards Organisations's Editors' Code of Practice. If you have a compaint about editorial content which relates to inaccuracy or intrusion, then please contact the editor here. If you are dissatisfied with the response provided you can contact IPSO here